Villa-Lis Des Champs
| Property Type | Villa - Lis Des Champs |
| Accommodation: | Self-catering |
| Location Type: | Beach, resort ( 5 Minutes walk from sea) |
| Theme: | Family, luxury |
| General: | Air-conditioning, |
| Kitchen: | Freezer , fridge, Gas hob, microwave, Toaster, Coffee Maker , Dishwasher, washing machine - Breakfast bar |
| Living Room: | living area seating for 6 people |
| Dining: | Dining area, seating for 6 people |
| Bathrooms: | 3 ensuite shower rooms /WC , + 1 downstairs WC |
| Bedrooms: | 1 ensuite Master , 1 ensuite double , 1 Twin room (ensuite) , sleeps a maximum of 6 people - linen provided |
| Entertainment: | CD, radio, stereo system, Television |
| Outside | Balcony, garage, communal garden, swimming pool, terrace , |
| Suitability: | Children welcome, pets not allowed, wheelchair inaccessible |
| Local Activities: | Cycling, fishing, sailing, swimming, tennis, squash, water skiing, wind-surfing, scuba diving. 5 MIN WALK TO SPAR (GROCERY SHOP), CAFES, BARS, RESTAURANTS, CAR HIRE ETC |
| Security | 24 hours security guard |
| Safety deposit boxes | none |
| Mosquito | The villa is equipped with mosquito repelling machines in each bedroom. |
| Electrical plugs | The villa uses UK 3 pins plugs |
Contact: Pajani 07960 016 171 or info@propertiesforlondon.co.uk
Prime London homes see prices rise again
By Daniel Thomas, Property Correspondent
Published: July 29 2009 15:37 | Last updated: July 29 2009 19:04
Demand from overseas buyers and a shortage of supply has led to a fourth consecutive month of price rises for prime central London properties.
Prices for homes valued above £1m in the capital rose 1.5 per cent in July, according to Knight Frank, the estate agency. Prices have climbed more than 5 per cent since April, although they have still fallen 14.4 per cent on an annual basis.
Overseas buyers have increased their share by a fifth during the past year, last month accounting for 43 per cent of home purchases.
The market revival has been led by Chelsea and Kensington, where prices have risen by more than 6 per cent since March. Houses have outperformed flats.
There are signs that the lower end of the prime market is seeing the most interest, with homes of less than £2.5m rising by more than 5 per cent in the past three months, compared with 3.9 per cent for properties priced at more than £10m.
Liam Bailey, head of residential research at Knight Frank, said prices had risen across every sub-market, area, price band and property type. While the UK market had seen a similar bounce in recent months, prime housing appeared to be leading the sector by some margin, he added.
Mr Bailey attributed the improved performance to three fundamentals: returning confidence, resilient demand and plummeting supply.
“One factor underpinning all else is the fact that prices fell very hard and very fast a little more than six months ago,” he said.
“We can never discount the possibility of further price falls later in 2009 or even next year. The evidence so far is that the prime London market is proving resilient due to real demand requirements from UK and overseas buyers and that tight supply is underpinning prices.”
He added that applicant numbers were up 37 per cent in the second quarter against the same period the previous year.
While the three biggest overseas markets remained European, Russian and North American, the second quarter saw a doubling in the proportion of overseas demand from Africa, Asia, Australia, China, Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan, Uzbekistan and the Middle East.
The volume of properties available in central London in July was down 34 per cent compared with the same month a year earlier. The number of properties coming to market in autumn shows no improvement, however, with the pipeline down 42 per cent over the same period.
Call to build even more houses
England needs to build even more houses than previously thought to keep housing costs under control, according to a report from the government’s chief adviser on housing affordability, writes Daniel Pimlott.
The country must add between 276,900 and 290,500 homes every year to its stock to avoid the rising cost of property affecting economic competitiveness, the National Housing and Planning Advice Unit is to warn on Thursday.
That is about 3-5 per cent more homes than the figure contained in a report last year.
The reason is that a fall in demand – because of lower immigration and a tighter mortgage market – has failed to offset pressures on housing stock caused by rising life expectancy and bigger families.
“The recession will have little impact on the number of homes we need to build over the next 20 years,” said Stephen Nickell, chairman of NHPAU.
The fall in housebuilding during the downturn would have to be made up when the recession was over if the country wanted to avoid overcrowding and adult children living with their parents for longer, as well as the potential for even more extreme boom and bust cycles, the report warned.
UK house prices rise for third straight month
UK house prices rise for third straight month
By Daniel Pimlott
Published: July 30 2009 08:03 | Last updated: July 30 2009 08:03
House prices in the UK rose by 1.3 per cent in July, according to the latest figures from Nationwide, taking the rate of growth over the last three months to its highest level in more than two years and adding to signs that the housing market is bottoming out.
Prices rose for the third month in a row, the Nationwide index showed, following increases of 1 per cent in June and 1.3 per cent in May. The three-month-on-three-month rate of change reached 2.6 per cent, the highest since February 2007.
The Nationwide index has shown growth in four out of the last six months, and signs of stabilisation in the housing market are backed up by other surveys, although Nationwide has been the most positive. The Halifax index has shown intermittent growth this year, while the Land Registry index, which lags Halifax and Nationwide by several months, rose for the first time in almost 18 months in June.
For the first seven months of 2009 as a whole, prices rose by a cumulative 1.3 per cent, suggesting there is now a reasonable chance that prices could end the year slightly higher than where they started. Only a few months ago, such an outcome would have appeared unthinkable,” said Martin Gahbauer, Nationwide’s chief economist.
But many economists are sceptical that the run of good news on house prices will continue. Although mortgage approvals for homes have risen sharply, they remain below the levels that many think are consistent with rising prices. Furthermore the Royal Institute for Chartered Surveyors has said that although demand for housing has risen sharply, house prices appear to be being supported by a lack of supply as wary sellers keep their properties out of a depressed market. Finally, with unemployment expected to continue to rise, demand for house purchases may well ebb later in the year.
Mr Gahbauer said that the rise in prices came as pent up demand that had been held back during the worst of the crisis last year was reaching the market. “Although the resulting rise in transactions has not been that dramatic, it has been enough to produce an upward bounce in prices because it coincided with very low levels of supply on the market,” he said. “If prices continue to increase at the rate of the last three months, they would soon rise to levels that would be noticeably out of line with earnings, rents and other fundamental determinants of housing valuations… It is unlikely, therefore, that price increases can be sustained for long at the very strong rate observed over the last few months.”
Harrods Estates
London Property Sales
Even in a difficult market, the golden rules for selling a property do not change
What a difference a few months can make! There is little arguing that in today’s cooling market, owners need to work hard at selling their property. The days when putting a home up for sale and waiting for competing offers to come pouring in are long gone, so how do sellers deal with this new reality?
Realistic pricing is the answer; an upbeat market can be accommodating even when a property is not priced correctly, but in a challenging market, price is usually a make it or break it factor. Buyers are more price-sensitive and know that they are in a superior negotiation position. Also, in difficult market conditions, it is wise to accept that it can take considerably longer to sell a property.
So what makes a house sell? A successful sale requires focusing on a number of factors; bur most importantly the asking price must reflect current market expectations. The location of the property is obviously a huge factor. Prime Central London areas such as Knightsbridge, Belgravia or Mayfair will retain their value as they are extremely sought after areas. Over recent months, Harrods Estates have seen an increase in the number of sales in prime Central London, in particular in the exclusive portered developments. In fact, a record pound per square foot was achieved in one of these developments earlier in the year proving that even in a recession, good quality, sought after property – sells. Buyers seeking property in high end areas will generally also require first class security for their home and family, 24 hour portage and secure parking. Properties must be presented well and be clean and clutter free. When interior designing, go for neutral colors and top class appliances which are in keeping with the luxury nature of the property and will hopefully create a scene that a potential purchaser can see themselves living in.
If you have any enquiries or need friendly advice on all aspects of selling your property, Feel free to contact Harrods Estates’ Knightsbridge office on +44 (0) 20 7225 6506 and Mayfair on +44 (0) 20 7409 9001.
From Boom to Bust
For the past 18 months, Phil Spencer’s life has had all the drama, jeopardy and upset of an episode of Location, Location, Location – without the happy ending. The television presenter’s home finding business, Garrington, went into administration early this year. “It was very scary,” he says. “The company was based on giving people advice on buying property and when no one was buying, we didn’t have any business.”
How could Spencer – the property guru who helps first-time buyers find their dream homes on Location, Location, Location and Relocation, Relocation – have got it so wrong?
“We’d done good business in the first half of the year, then summer was quiet but we had enough buyers on our books to tough it out. We thought things could improve,” he admits.
In hindsight, he says, the fixed costs were too high. “We were very exposed, and things unravelled extremely quickly. Once Lehman went down we looked for some investors to help with short-term cash flow. We lined up a couple but at the last minute they pulled out,” he says.
But Spencer wasn’t prepared to admit defeat, and put his own money into saving the failing business. “I’d put 12 years into developing it, and a lot of heartache and energy,” he says. “You can’t walk away from it so you end up chasing it down a rabbit hole.”
The company has been taken over by the manager of the Cambridge office – rather difficult to stomach, one might imagine. “He’s stripped out all the costs and he’s doing deals,” Spencer says. “I can’t dwell on it – it’s his now. If you’re in business you take chances. Perhaps I didn’t thoroughly grasp the level of risk as the company expanded.”
In the aftermath, rumours circulated that Spencer had upped sticks and moved to Australia. “I made a series over there and when I came back there was news in the press that I was off to Oz to find a house for myself,” he says.
In fact, he is getting on with his life in Britain – finding homes for private clients and for a new series of Location, Location, Location. “I love doing it. I’m a home finder. I’ll still be doing deals long after I’ve stopped appearing on telly,” he says.
Even while prices are falling? “I like to think our advice over the past 20 years on Location, Location, Location has never been about making money; it’s about finding people homes,” he says.
“The problem is, though, people expect to make money from their homes in this country. Surely you work to make money – a house is to shelter your family? We’ve always advised people to buy for the long term; to buy something flexible that can be adapted to suit your needs or altered to add value. I see the property market as a game of snakes and ladders. The least number of moves it takes you to get to the top, the better.”
He adopted this attitude when he bought the family home in Wandsworth four years ago, where he lives with his wife Fiona and sons Jake, five, and Ben, three. “We’ve been renovating it recently and it’s a strange sensation spending to make a house bigger when it’s value is going through the floor. But I wanted to create a home that the family could grow into. I bought it for the location. I homed in on a street, then the section of the street and the side. I wasn’t fussy about the house; I knew I could adapt that,” he says.
Spencer trained as a surveyor, before becoming a home finder in the Nineties. “I wouldn’t say I was the first, but I was probably second or third, and Kirstie [Allsopp] was the fourth. It dawned on me that we have the most biased property market in the world – it’s crazy. All the help is on one side of the deal. But as a buyer it’s the biggest amount of money you spend as well as an emotional upheaval.”
The new series of Location, Location, Location starts next week and Spencer believes it’s the best series yet – even though it was filmed 18 months ago, as Britain’s property market started to flounder. “All we can do when we’re filming is give advice tailored to the market at the time,” he says. “Northern Rock hadn’t gone down when we started, but by the time we’d finished there was a lack of liquidity. You see it happening across the series and we filmed individual packages more recently to explain what happened. Prices are bound to be different from today’s market but I’m sure those watching will appreciate that price is irrelevant, it’s the process.”
The property market, he says, is now more polarised than ever. “The London market is driven by the City, which was harshly punished at the end of last year. But most of the redundancies have happened now and people are less afraid,” Spencer adds. Prices reached the bottom in February and have been strengthening since then, he says, but it’s a more troubling picture in the regions.
“I worry about unemployment; if big companies and industry are going down as the recession bites, there will be more forced selling – we could be in for some horrendous statistics of repossessions by September. It could get quite scary in certain parts of the country.” he says.
But Spencer doesn’t think the recession will dampen people’s desire to own homes. “It’s going to be harder to do, but arguably it shouldn’t be as easy as it was. We’ve had a shock, but we’ll look back and think the adjustments that are happening are good.”
Can we change our attitude to borrowing money overnight? “Our parents’ generation was grateful to be given a mortgage; they’d dress up smartly to go to the bank. Now there’s a queue of people lending money and unfortunately we have to bear the consequences,” Spencer says.
He believes financial management should be taught in schools. “We’re not educated in managing personal finances, no one tells us. In the same way estate agents sell houses, banks lend you money. The country follows its leaders and the leaders are borrowing money.”
As soon as banks loosen their borrowing criteria, the property market will pick up, he says. “The relationship between total number of households and the number of properties is getting worse each month. Once someone says we’re good to go, we’ll be back to boom and bust again – and this is not a good thing.”
Location, Location, Location starts Wednesday Aug 5, 8pm on Channel 4
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Dramatic rise in number of buyers
A surge in buyers coupled with a shortage of new properties for sale is propping up house prices, it is claimed today.
The number of buyers registered with estate agents has risen by 36 per cent in the last six months, while the number of homes on the market is up by just 6.4 per cent.
The net effect is that the fall in property prices has been halted, according to industry analysts Hometrack.
Its research shows that house prices have held steady for the last two months, with the average for England and Wales put at 155,600 pounds.
Only three per cent of postcode areas saw price falls during last month, down from 32 per cent in April and around 60 per cent at the beginning of the year.
Hometrack’s director of research, Richard Donnell, said: ‘A lack of supply and rising demand have combined to prop up house prices in the last two months.’
Other data on the housing market has been increasingly positive in the past few weeks, but economists have warned that they do not think the market has reached the bottom yet.
Mr Donnell said: ‘The two key risks for the market are either a renewed weakening in demand or a surge in the volume of housing for sale.
‘Given the uncertain outlook for the economy, it is the demand side where the greatest risk lies, as many would-be buyers continue to remain cautious or are unable to obtain sufficient equity or finance to access the market.’
Demand for property is strongest in London and the South East, where estate agents have reported rises of 52 per cent and 46 per cent respectively in interest from potential buyers during the first half of the year.
The figure in Wales is a more modest 19 per cent, with 20per cent in the North East.
Separate research from the National Association of Estate Agents suggests that the supply of property is now finally beginning to increase.
A third of estate agents reported a 10 per cent rise in the number of properties on the market compared with six months ago, while one in six said they had seen a 20 per cent increase.
Council of Mortgage Lenders
One of the surprises of recent months has been the increase in buyer interest recorded by both the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors and the National Association of Estate Agents. Even through deep economic gloom and sharply rising unemployment, our appetite for owning property is apparently undiminished, and may have been sharpened by lower prices.
Bob Pannell, head of research at the Council of Mortgage Lenders (CML), recently gave a presentation on the desire and expectation of home ownership. “We are going through a challenging and difficult transition, and lenders, developers, planners and households are all affected,” he said. “The result may be that the base of home ownership is a little narrower than in the past and the prospect of capital gains somewhat more modest.”
He took comfort from the fact that attitudes to buying appear to be stable through thick and thin. Surveys dating back to the early 1980s consistently show that between 80% and 90% of the three key age groups — under-25s, 25- to 34-year-olds and 35-to 54-year-olds — see home ownership as their preferred form of tenure in 10 years’ time. The big change has been in older age groups. Buying a home was once felt to be beyond their grasp, but Margaret Thatcher’s right-to-buy legislation and rising prosperity changed that. Today, actual home ownership in Britain is just under 70%.
A slightly different picture was presented this month by the National Housing and Planning Advice Unit, which was set up by the government to advise on housing supply. It commissioned the pollster YouGov to ask 18- to 34-year-olds about attitudes to housing. A fifth of those not currently owning plan to buy in the next 12 months. Otherwise, nonowners in this age group were lukewarm, with only 43% saying they aspired to buy, and seven in 10 expressing concern about the financial responsibility and commitment of ownership.
The surveys are not necessarily incompatible. The CML’s numbers include people who already have their own home, for whom still owning in a decade is natural. The YouGov survey highlights how many young people no longer regard ownership as a goal, and prefer the flexibility of renting. Perhaps 70% is as high as it can go.
- Bad news for young people trying to get their foot on the property ladder — last week, the consultancy firm Capital Economics predicted that parental help is not likely to increase in the near future. Although the percentage of first-time buyers being helped by family to gather a deposit has doubled in the past two years, the actual number of first-timers helped onto the ladder in this way has dropped by 25% since 2007, according to figures from the Council of Mortgage Lenders.
- Prime London suburbs are leading the way in the recovery, as expected. Figures from Knight Frank estate agency show that prices in parts of the capital such as Hampstead, Richmond, Wandsworth, Wimbledon and Fulham rose by 3.7% in the three months to the end of June. Stock is still low, though, with the supply of new property down by 40% compared with a year ago.
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Royal Institute of Chartered Surveyors Property Survey
The latest property market survey from the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors suggested that new buyer enquiries increased at the fastest pace since records began a decade ago.
The strongest increases were in the North and London, followed by the East and West Midlands.
It comes as the average number of properties on estate agents books dropped from 58.5 in May to 56.9 in June, 32 per cent lower than a year ago.
A shortage of properties and renewed interest from buyers is like to help boost prices, with 18.1 per cent more chartered surveyors report a fall than a rise in June compared to 43.8 per cent in May.
Confidence in future prices has also increased, turning positive for the first time since May 2007.
Jeremy Leaf, spokesperson at RICS, said: “Although the market is showing signs of improvement, it is unlikely that there will be a sustained upturn while mortgage lenders remain risk adverse.”
He added: “A lack of stock on the market is providing a platform for modest price increases. While supply remains tight, the market may continue to show tentative signs of firming but instructions are starting to increase in some regions and this could dampen any meaningful recovery as long as economic conditions remain quite so uncertain.”
Neil Foster, a RICS member based in Newcastle, said: “Buyers are increasingly willing to transact but many remain unable to do so as a consequence of constraints imposed by lenders.”
And Anthony Jamieson, a RICS member based in Surrey, said: “There is now a definite shortage of instructions and with the market having shown signs of improving, there are a number of good quality purchasers wanting to buy but with nothing to look at.”
Estate agents gave the strongest indication yet that the housing market slump is over, reporting that the number of people looking to buy a home is at the highest level in a decade.
New buyer enquiries have risen every months since November and are currently climbing at the fastest pace since August 1999, according to the latest property market survey from the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors.
It said 48 per cent more estate agents reported a rise rather than a fall in interest from new buyers in May.
The survey also suggested that the rebound in enquiries is feeding through into increased sales, with the number of properties that estate agents are selling over three months edging up from 10.6 in April to 11.8 in May.
Ian Perry, a spokesman for RICS, said: “On the face of it, the housing market does appear to be close to bottoming out with activity picking up in a material way and prices at last stabilising.
“However, with the economic backdrop still quite uncertain, unemployment is set to continue increasing sharply and finance for first-time buyers is still in short supply, there are a number of significant obstacles for the market to overcome over the coming months.”
The RICS survey also disclosed that there has been a reduction in the overall number of estate agents reporting falling prices.
It said 44.1 per cent more estate agents reported prices were falling rather than rising in May, compared to 58.7 per cent the previous month.
It comes after Britain’s biggest mortgage lender, Halifax, said house prices dropped 16.3 per cent during the past year to £158,585.
Mortgage experts warned that borrowers may still find it difficult to find an affordable home loan as lenders began raising their rates, particularly on fixed-rate deals.
Melanie Bien, of mortgage brokers Savills Private Finance, said: “While this is excellent news, we are not out of the woods just yet as fixed-rate mortgages are starting to rise and lenders retain tight criteria, which are making things more difficult for borrowers.”
Lenders have defended high rates in the past saying that the cost of the borrowing is based on so-called Libor or swap rates rather than the Bank Rate.
But research shows that the profit margins between the rates that banks charge their customers and Libor or swap rates have widen since the beginning of the credit crisis from less than 0.4 per cent in August 2007 to more than 2.7 per cent today.
Keith Johnson, a RICS member based in Durham City, said: “While the market is still somewhat erratic and very price sensitive there are good signs of recovery.”
And Richard Sayer, a RICS member based in Northumberland, said: “This is an excellent market for many buyers and sellers to be testing their options.”
